Publications

May 2018 (Revised February 2020)
Case

Jason Blum's Blumhouse Productions

By: Anita Elberse

In March 2017, Jason Blum, the founder and chief executive officer of film and television production company Blumhouse Productions, has another blockbuster on his hands with the movie Get Out, produced for just $4.5 million. Remarkable returns for its micro-budget... View Details

November 2006 (Revised June 2007)
Case

Centre Partners - American Seafoods 2003

Centre Partners, a leading private equity firm, is contemplating ways to realize liquidity from its successful investment in American Seafoods Corp., Inc. An apparently innovative solution is developed, which calls for issuing Income Deposit Securities. Does this... View Details

Keywords: Private Equity; Financial Liquidity; Capital Structure; Financial Services Industry

Find at Harvard

November 2008 (Revised October 2009)
Case

American Cancer Society: Access to Care

By: Robert L. Simons and Kathryn Rosenberg

CEO John Seffrin decides to radically change the strategy of the American Cancer Society. The new Access to Care strategy relies on advocacy to change public policy and increase the number of Americans eligible for cancer prevention and treatment. The new strategy... View Details

Keywords: Values and Beliefs; Governance Controls; Leading Change; Organizational Change and Adaptation; Organizational Structure; Nonprofit Organizations; Business Strategy; Health Industry; United States

February 2011 (Revised November 2012)
Case

Product Development at OPOWER

By: Thomas Eisenmann and Rob Go

OPOWER, a software startup that helps utilities engage their customers in ways that reduce energy consumption, is scaling rapidly. The company's new head of product management has designed a system to address a point of constant tension: whether to build custom... View Details

Keywords: Business Startups; Customer Relationship Management; Entrepreneurship; Growth Management; Product Development; Sales; Customization and Personalization; Energy Conservation; Environmental Sustainability; Information Technology Industry; Utilities Industry

03 May 2017
Book

The Clear Connection Between Slavery and American Capitalism

Keywords: by Dina Gerdeman

01 Mar 2008
News

An American Odyssey

moral issue in the end. But to solve the problem, we first have to define it properly. Then it’s for the American people and their leaders to decide what they want to do with the findings.” America has... View Details

Keywords: Garry Emmons; Lawrence Fouraker; Business Schools & Computer & Management Training; Educational Services; Finance

September 2009 (Revised October 2010)
Case

Elkay Plumbing Products Division

By: Robert S. Kaplan

The vice president of sales learns that the most profitable 1% of the division's customers generate 100% of profits, and that two of the division's largest customers lose 50% of profits. The division has just finished a project to install a time-driven activity-based... View Details

Keywords: Activity Based Costing and Management; Profit; Management Systems; Consumer Products Industry; Consumer Products Industry

24 Oct 2017
Blog Post

The Latin American Community at HBS

Latin American is a state of being, not a regional denomination. Or at least that is what I learned at Harvard Business School. Upon arriving at HBS, members of the Latin American community took conscious... View Details

Research Summary

Selection, Reallocation, and Spillover: Identifying the Sources of Gains from Multinational Production (with Maggie Chen)

By: Laura Alfaro

Quantifying the gains from multinational production has been a vital topic of economic research. Positive productivity gains are often attributed to knowledge spillover from multinational to domestic firms. An alternative, less stressed explanation is firm selection... View Details

Keywords: Gains From Multinational Production; Firm Selection; Knowledge Spillover

23 Jul 2021
Blog Post

Trends in Consumer Products

A job search in Consumer Products requires thorough research to understand how Covid has affected a company’s business. Most consumer products companies had very uneven business results—some brands saw... View Details

October 2003 (Revised August 2005)
Case

American Legacy: Beyond the Truth Campaign

By: Youngme E. Moon and Kerry Herman

The hard-hitting "Truth" campaign has been one of the most successful antismoking initiatives in history. The focus of the "Truth" campaign is to dissuade teenagers from smoking. The sponsor of the campaign, the American Legacy Foundation, is now trying to decide... View Details

Keywords: Advertising Campaigns; Communication Strategy; Customer Focus and Relationships; Decision Choices and Conditions; Ethics; Brands and Branding; Corporate Social Responsibility and Impact

05 May 2020
News

China Tariffs and Coronavirus a Double Hit to American Retailers

16 Dec 2021
Blog Post

African American Student Union Spotlight on STEM

The HBS African American Student Union (AASU) strives to be an extended family for its members from the moment they decide to attend HBS, through the transition to second year, and beyond graduation. Here we... View Details

06 Feb 2023
Blog Post

African American Student Union Spotlight on HBCUs

The HBS African American Student Union (AASU) strives to be an extended family for its members from the moment they decide to attend HBS, through the transition to second year, and beyond graduation. Here we... View Details

01 Sep 2008
News

An American Story

positions had been filled. Undeterred, Boris had his two sons, Albert and Ted, stage a fight at the street corner. When the security guard left his post to break it up, Boris slipped into the building and talked his way into a job. That... View Details

Keywords: Colleges, Universities, and Professional Schools; Educational Services

Research Summary

Automotive Product Development

At present, my primary research focus is studying product development in the auto industry. I am working with Stefan Thomke (HBS) and Takahiro Fujimoto (University of Tokyo) on the 4th Round of the Global Automotive Development Study. The first round of this... View Details

14 Dec 2007
Op-Ed

When Your Product Becomes a Commodity

offshoring are all squeezing margins, increasing customer price sensitivity, and making it harder to sustain inter-brand differentiation. The product life cycle suggests that, as View Details

Keywords: by John Quelch

December 2007 (Revised October 2008)
Case

The American National Red Cross (A)

By: Jay W. Lorsch, Eliot Sherman and David Chen

Describes the governance issues facing the Board of Governors of the American Red Cross. After a series of issues--FDA consent decree on its blood operations; the response to 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina--the Red Cross board was under pressure to fix its governance from... View Details

Keywords: Corporate Governance; Governing and Advisory Boards; Management Practices and Processes; Service Operations; Business Processes; Non-Governmental Organizations; Service Industry